Echoes of the Past
by Jediknight2713
Summary: This is my first fanfiction. It's a novelization of Knights of the Old Republic 2. LSF Exile/BaoDur. Because I think he's a much better match for her than Atton in so many ways. Constructive criticism is very welcome.
1. Chapter 1

_ Awaken._ The word echoed through Lorraina Eshara's subconscious, soft and insistant. The peaceful, pleasant darkness began to recede as her mind was pulled back into the waking world. The kolto tank she hung suspended in sensed her stirring and shut itself off. The translucent liquid drained quickly through vents in the bottom of the container and then the thick glass door swung outward. Her restraints snapped open, and Lorraina Eshara toppled to the floor.

She lay there dazed for a moment before rolling over onto her back and staring at the open tank, confused. She blinked rapidly and glanced around.

"Where am I?" She inquired out loud, of no one in particular. There was no one to ask. The only other beings in the round room were four men in four other kolto tanks. They were all dead. Lorraina pushed herself to her feet and swayed unsteadily for a moment. "Hello?" She called out. "Is there anybody here?" There was no reply, only the humming of the kolto tanks.

A prickly feeling of apprehension settled over Lorraina and she rubbed at the goose bumps on her arms, unsure whether they were from fear or cold. It was certainly cold, and Lorraina's skimpy, gray one piece undergarment wasn't helping. First thing to do, she thought wryly, find some clothes. She headed down the short hallway and came to two doors, across from one another.

The one on the right was magnetically sealed. But the one on the left slid open at Lorraina's touch. She stepped forward and found herself in an office of sorts. There was a computer terminal to her left and against the far left wall a laboratory station. On her right were a plastisteel cylinder and a deactivated console.

Lorraina raided the cylinder first, in hopes of clothing. To her disappointment she found only a few medpacks and stimulants. Next stop, computer terminal. Lorraina deftly sliced it and began to search for any clues as to where she was and what had happened.

She watched several logs in which a female medical officer talked of a mining accident and of a freighter that had found its way to the station. Apparently there were only two people on it, one already dead and the other critically injured. The injured one was identified and referred to as a Jedi. Lorraina couldn't remember having boarded a freighter of any kind.

The last thing she could recall was being aboard the Harbinger on her way to Telos, to rendezvous with some Republic officer Revan had told her about the last time Lorraina had seen her. _Revan. _Lorraina shook her head, pushing the anger and the grief away. She had more pressing things to worry about at the moment.

"The Jedi must be me." Lorraina muttered bitterly, focusing on the control panel again."Some Jedi." She couldn't even feel the Force anymore, hadn't felt it since-since _that day._ The day Malachor died, a traitorous part of her mind finished the sentence. _Not now! _Lorraina pleaded silently. There would be time for memories later. The door across the hall, leading to the morgue, slid open as Lorraina sliced the controls. She also made a point of unlocking the storage closet behind her. After raiding the later she proceeded to the former.

It was a small room, with metal tables lining three out of four walls. Only two of the tables were in use. On one to her left lay an old woman with long gray braids, likely Lorraina's mysterious companion. She wore a dark brown hooded robe with flowing sleeves much like that Jedi would wear. But there was nothing to say who she had been or why she and Lorraina had apparently been travelling together.

The next body, on one of the tables against the wall across from the door, was male, wearing a tattered blue and brown uniform. A plasma torch was clipped to the man's belt, apparently his only possession. After a moment's hesitation, Lorraina grabbed the torch and turned to leave the morgue. But she froze in her steps when she saw that the woman in the Jedi robes was sitting up.

"Find what you're looking for amongst the dead?" The woman inquired, faintly mocking. Her voice was familiar and Lorraina paled a little as she realized where she'd heard it.

"I heard your voice when I was in the Kolto tank." She said quietly. The woman nodded, keeping her head down so that her large hood concealed her eyes.

"I had hoped as much." She replied sliding down from her perch. "We had both slept for far too long."

"Slept?" "I thought you were dead." Lorraina exclaimed.

"Dead? No." "But far closer to it than I would have liked." The woman explained. "I was a healing trance, which can be mistaken by ordinary people for death."

"Who are you?" Lorraina demanded, staring in fascination at the old woman.

"I am Kreia and I am your rescuer, as you are mine." The woman answered cryptically. She continued before Lorraina could ask her to clarify. "The ship you were on, the Harbinger, was attacked. "I was able to get you off that ship and onto another but we took heavy damage and we were both injured." "I do not know what happened after that, or how we ended up here." "The ship we arrived on must still be docked here though." "We must find it and leave this place before our enemies arrive."

"Enemies?" Lorraina interjected.

"Yes, the Sith." "They hunt all Jedi." Kreia explained.

"How did you know I am Jedi?" Lorraina demanded.

"I can feel it." "You are the one they call Exile, are you not?"

"Yes." "The Jedi Order and I have a….troubled history." Lorraina admitted.

"So it would seem." "Keep your past." Kreia ordered, "Focus on the now." "Go and find our ship." "Also, you might wish to extend your search to some clothing, if only for proper first impressions." Lorraina resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

"Alright, where should we begin?" She asked casually. Kreia lifted her head slightly and Lorraina caught of glimpse of her eyes. They were a milky, sightless white.

"We?" Kreia replied, almost sharply. "_We_ shall not begin anywhere." "_You_ may begin anywhere you choose." "I shall remain here and center myself." With that, Kreia sank into a meditation trance and was silent. Lorraina shrugged and left the morgue.

There was a door at the end of the hallway that seemed to be the only exit from this section of the station. But when Raina tried to open it she found it was stuck tight. "This is where a plasma torch comes in very handy." She muttered, and cut through the locking mechanism. The door slid open reluctantly and Lorraina darted through the opening, into the corridor beyond. And found herself staring into the mining lasers of two very angry droids.


	2. Chapter 2

There was no time to contemplate why mining droids would be attacking organics. They opened fire almost immediately. "Sithspit!" Lorrain hissed, dodging the plasma cutters they wielded. Brandishing her own torch, she hacked at them until they were a pile of smoking parts. Which she then rifled through to scavenge anything useful. Like computer spikes, she thought as she tucked them into her right shoe. A quick visual scan of the room showed Lorraina two possible exits-the corridor ahead of her and an escape tunnel to her right. She decided to try the tunnel first.

Its entrance was blocked by a heavy blast door, sealed magnetically. "Strange," The old woman said suddenly. Lorraina gasped, whirling around. The room was empty. "In my vision the door was open." She continued. Lorraina scowled, realizing the telepathy for what it was now. She had never liked having other people in her head. At least not without permission.

"Kreia?" She said out loud, her voices echoing faintly off the metal walls. There was no reply. With a shake of her head, she headed for the open corridor. A short walk later she was in a small control room with a console, a small row of lockers and two corpses. The console was unhelpful but a search of the locker yielded a well made vibroblade.

Lorraina paused by the locked door on the far side of the room, glancing back at the dead men. She wondered if whatever had killed them would be waiting for her further ahead. As if to answer her question, Kreia spoke again.

"Can you feel them?" She asked.

"Feel what?" Lorraina demanded a bit impatiently, this time in her head.

"The droids in the next room." Kreia answered, matching her tone. "Reach out with the force, sense them."

"I can't." Lorraina replied reluctantly. "The Force was taken from me long ago."

"Perhaps but it was not lost to you." "Reach out, touch the Force and it will return to you." Lorraina hesitated only briefly before obeying. To her surprise, she felt it, like the haze of sleep being cleared from her mind. It was faint at first but she grabbed onto the feeling and pulled it towards her and then suddenly she was kneeling on the floor, gasping. The sudden, intense rush of awareness knocked the breath from her, like a gust of cold, fresh wind. She breathed deeply, letting it flow through her, cleansing the mental cobwebs from her mind.

"How did you do that?" She demanded out loud. "I have tried countless times to call the Force back to me and never could."

"Perhaps it was not yet time." Kreia suggested. "Now, reach out and explore the next room." Lorraina let her eyes slip shut and in her mind's eye, she walked right through the door in front her. The room she found herself in was small, lined with footlockers and guarded by three mining droids. "Good, very good." Kreia's voice echoed through her mind again and then faded away.


	3. Chapter 3

Lorraina opened her eyes and pulled herself to her feet. In seconds she had cut the door open and destroyed the droids. Then she set to work exploring the footlockers. To her disappointment, there were no clothes and after a few moments she moved on to the next door. Here the tunnel dead ended in a vast control room. Terminals lined three of the walls, that she could see, and several mining droids were on patrol.

"What the hell happened here?" She muttered, walking around the utterly silent and empty room after the droids had been taken care of. There was an administration terminal at the front of the room, situated before an enormous viewscreen that took up an entire wall. Lorraina sliced into the terminal but found to her chagrin that she was not skilled enough to do anything beyond deactivating a forcefield that protected a door on the other side of the room.

Hoping she mind find clothes there, Lorraina keyed the door open and stepped in.

"Nice outfit." A young man in a force cage drawled flirtatiously. "What, you miners change regs while I've been in here?" He was tall and lean with broad shoulders and tousled dark hair. His face was partially obscured by the beginnings of a beard but his though his hazel eyes glittered with unabashed appreciation at her half clad figure.

"Who are you?" Lorraina asked conversationally, deciding to ignore the flirting.

"Atton Rand." The man replied. "And you?"

"Lorraina Eshara." That woman answered, with some misgivings about telling him her full and real name. But Kreia, who had invaded Lorraina's head again just before she entered the holding area, seemed to think he could be trusted. Or at least that he wasn't a threat.

"I'd shake hands but I like mine." Atton glanced pointedly at the forcefield. Lorraina smirked.

"Patience, Mr. Rand." "We'll get to that." "First, can you tell me why you're locked up?"

"They said I brought contraband onto the station." "It was just a couple of decks of pazaak cards and some juma juice." "How was I supposed to know those things were banned?"

"Why are they banned?" "I mean, blasters I understand because of the fuel but pazaak cards?" Lorraina inquired, leaning against the security terminal across from Atton's force cage.

"The guy that locked me in here said there'd been a huge brawl between drunken miners over a high stakes pazaak match and some equipment was destroyed and then the boss banned both juma juice and pazaak." Atton shrugged. "Not my problem." "I was just making a delivery."

"Locking you up does seem a little harsh." Lorraina admitted, shifting to face the terminal.

"As does leaving me to starve." Atton replied dryly. "What happened to everyone anyway?" "I haven't seen anyone for almost two days?"

"That's because they're all dead." Lorraina turned to face the young man as the forcefield flickered off.

"All dead?" Atton repeated, shocked, as he stepped down off the cage base.

"Yeah, it looks like the mining droids went berserk and killed them all." Lorraina added. "Apparently they'd been having problems with the droids, among other things, for a couple of days."

"I don't know." Atton headed for the door. "I no sooner got here than they searched my ship and locked me up." "That was the last time I saw anyone." "At least until you showed up in your underwear

"Any idea why mining droids would suddenly turn on their masters?" Lorraina asked, following Atton out of the holding area.

"No and I don't like it." Atton shook his head, pausing by a damaged droid.

"You don't think it was just a malfunction?" Lorraina, who knew nothing of droids, asked.

"No." "Mining droids shouldn't even have the protocol to attack organics." "That means someone had to rewrite their programming." Atton replied grimly.

"Wouldn't someone notice if someone else was tinkering with all the droids?" Lorraina asked. "Or can you do that remotely?"

"They're probably all linked to a central command system which would have allowed the saboteur to control and alter the programming of all the droids from that terminal." Atton explained.

"You know a lot about this stuff." Lorraina remarked casually. Atton glanced over at her.

"Eh, I'm what you might call a slicer." "Computers and droids are my thing." He shrugged. "Enough about me though." "What exactly are you doing roaming around Peragus in your underwear?"

If Lorraina was embarrassed she gave no hint of it. "Trying to figure that out myself." "According to the old woman in the morgue my ship was attacked and she helped me get to another, which was also attacked and somehow we ended up here, but she doesn't know how."

Atton quirked one dark eyebrow spaceward and gave Lorraina a look that suggested she had taken leave of her senses. "Old woman in the morgue?" He asked dryly. Lorraina grinned.

"I wasn't talking to corpses." She assured him. "Though, I thought she was a corpse when I first entered the morgue." "She, er, was sleeping or something on a table there and woke up while I was examining a dead miner."

"She was sleeping in the morgue?" Atton frowned.

"Well, according to one of the medical holologs I watched, they thought she was dead." "She was really just in a healing trance but-

"Wait a minute!" "Healing trance?" "Are you telling me the old woman is a Jedi?" Atton demanded.

"Do you have a problem with Jedi?" Lorraina asked evenly.

"No, it's just you don't see many Jedi anymore." "There aren't very many left you know." Atton explained quickly.

"Not very many left?" "What happened to them?" Lorraina demanded, stunned by this news.

"Don't know." "No one does really." "I heard a bunch of them were killed on Kataar and all the rest just kind of disappeared." Atton told what he knew. "Probably for the best." "They're not real popular at the moment, not since they destroyed the galaxy with their civil war."

"What civil war?" Lorraina stumbled ahead of Atton to the seat before the administrative terminal and collapsed in it.

"Where have you been?" Atton wanted to know.

"I've been….away….since the Mandalorian War." Lorraina chose her words carefully.

"Well after the Mandalorian War ended Revan and Malak left for the unknown regions with half the Republic fleet, in search of some greater threat they sensed or something like that." "When they came back, they were Sith and they were leading an even greater armada than the one they'd left with." "They attacked the Republic and nearly destroyed it." "But then Revan was killed by Malak, or everyone thought she was." "And Malak kept fighting without her." "Turns out Malak had only injured her." "Anyway when she woke up she was a Jedi again, and she went hunting for Malak and eventually killed him." "They say the Jedi did something to Revan's mind while she was unconscious, made her a different person or tried to." "I don't really know the full story, only bits and pieces from here and there." "You might ask your Jedi friend." "I'm sure she knows all about it."

Lorraina nodded dumbly, trying to process all the horrifying information. "I knew about Revan and Malak, and what happened to them but I didn't know the Jedi were being wiped out." "And I didn't know about Kataar or the disappearances." "There have to be some of them left, somewhere." "They can't all be dead."

"You act like you knew them." Atton observed.

"I did." "I was friends with many of them, trained by some." Lorraina said softly.

"You're a Jedi too." Atton's voice and face were carefully blank this time but it was not quite enough to hide his discomfort.

"Yes and no." Lorraina replied cryptically. Atton's mouth quirked downward in a frown.

"What does that mean?" He demanded, his voice hard. Lorraina leaned back in her seat and folded her hands her lap.

"I was exiled from the Order, because I went to war with Revan." She admitted quietly.

"The exiled you for defending the Republic?" Atton raised an eyebrow. "Seems harsh." Lorraina shrugged.

"They had their reasons." She muttered.

"Wait a minute, Lorraina Eshara, Mandalorian Wars-are you General Eshara?" Atton sat up straight and stared at the half naked girl in a new light.

"Yeah, I was." Lorraina said. "How'd you know?"

"Everyone who served in the war knows that name." "The name of the woman who ended the war." Atton replied.

"You in yet?" Lorraina changed the subject, watching Atton's fingers fly across the screen.

"Yep, right…..now." He gave the screen a final tap and smiled in exultation. Then he frowned. "Sithspit." He hissed.

"You're about to tell me something I'm not going to like, aren't you?" Lorraina guessed dryly. Atton smirked.

"How'd you guess?" He asked, equally dryly. "I was looking for the controls for the escape exits but they've been rerouted to another terminal-down in the fuel depot it looks like."

"They wanted to cut off all exits from the administration level." Lorraina scowled at the console as if it was the thing responsible for all the carnage and their current predicament. "Someone wants us, or someone else, trapped here."

"Sure seems like it." Atton agreed. "There's no way this is anything other than deliberate." "Anyway, there's nothing else we can do with this console."  
"What about communications?" Lorraina leaned forward, peering over Atton's arm.

"We can try." "There." He said at last. "We're in."

"Can I?" Lorraina asked, gesturing toward the console. Atton stood up and backed away.

"Sure, have at it." He nodded. Lorraina slid into the seat Atton had previously occupied and looked at the screen. The communications array was up and ready and she set to work. She tried first to call any miners in the barracks, then she tried a station-wide call for any miners, after which she hailed any ships within range. Her efforts were met only by silence. As hope faded, Lorraina tried one last thing. She opened all frequencies and leaned toward the console.

"Is anyone out there?" She said, her voice sounding small and lonely as it echoed through the station.

"Dweep!" A mechanical voice answered. Both Lorraina and Atton shot to their feet.

"Hello!" She called, and held her breath.

"Beep boop."

Lorraina flashed a smile at an incredulous Atton. "An astromech." She exclaimed. "Are you operational?" She said into the comm. There was a reply, in binary and Lorraina nodded. "Good, we're trapped on the bridge." "Is there any way at all off of it?" "Well, it's better than staying up here forever." "Yes that means please open it." "Thank you, what was your designation?" "Ah, thank you T3." "See you in a bit." Lorraina turned to Atton. "I'm heading down there to check things out." "Stay here and keep an eye on things."

"You're taking the exit into the mines?" Atton said. "Are you insane?"

"Possibly but that's beside the point." Lorraina quipped dryly. "Someone's gotta save our skins." "Besides, I'd rather risk my life than yours."

"Why?" Atton asked without thinking. Lorraina glanced over her shoulder at him as she headed for the emergency exit.

"Because I already have enough blood on my hands." She replied quietly.

"Hey." Atton said, slipping his communicator cuff from his wrist. Lorraina paused and half turned toward him. "At least take this." He insisted, holding it out to her. "I'll tune the comm system to that frequency." "I'll scout it out for you up here." "I'm sure there are schematics somewhere and I can use the comm to track your progress."

"Thanks." Lorraina said with a tiny smile, sliding the device onto her small wrist.

"No problem." He replied and she turned away from him and made her way back down the hallway toward the emergency exit.


	4. Chapter 4

The door of the emergency exit stood open now and Lorraina hesitated only long enough to ascertain there were no demented droids waiting on the other side before striding through. A turbolift at the end of a short hallway caught her eyes. She took a step forward and then jumped when the exit door slammed shut behind her. An examination revealed no way to open it from the inside. Even had she wanted to, there was no backing out now, so Lorraina once again made for the turbolift. It took her down to a tunnel carved out of rough asteroid stone, dimly lit by overhead lights embedded in the rock.

"How many tunnels do they have in this place?" Lorraina muttered out loud and then clamped her mouth shut when her voice reverberated off the walls and echoed around her. There was door, not a hundred feet before her and it was marked as an entry to the mine shafts.

Just before she reached the door, Lorraina found and raided a plasteel cylinder. She found a few mining shields, some demolitions gear and to her delight a mining uniform. She had just stepped away from the cylinder and began to unzip the uniform when her comm cuff crackled to life.

"Hey, you there?" Atton called.

"I'm here." Lorraina called. "I found a storage cylinder with some supplies-some shields, demo stuff, and it looks like there's a uniform here too."

"Dang-I mean-good." "All that skin is distracting, for the droids I mean." Atton trailed off awkwardly, leaving Lorraina choking back laughter.

"Sure, wouldn't want to distract the droids." She teased. She heard Atton chuckle.

"Anyway, there's a lot of interference down there so I can't get a good readout of what's ahead." Atton admitted. "It's probably safe to say there's a lot of angry droids so I'd equip one of those shields."

"Got it, any other tips?" Lorraina asked.

"Just be careful." Atton warned, and then seeming afraid of sounding too caring, he added, "I don't want to be stuck on this station alone."

"Don't worry, I've been in worse situations than this and come out alright." Lorraina assured the man on the bridge.

"Alright, still, be careful." Atton added.

"I will." Lorraina said and then began to pull the miner's uniform on. It was several sides too big so Lorraina had to roll up the legs and sleeves and cinch it around the waist with the demolitions belt she'd found in the cylinder.

Lorriana thought wryly to herself as she proceeded into the dark, warm mining shaft that at least the uniform provided more than adequate coverage. Her underwear most definitely wouldn't be on display for Atton anymore.

"Sithspit it's hot in here." She muttered, walking into a cavernous room with rough stone walls and a fuel vent in one corner. There were several mining droids patrolling the area and Lorraina quickly stealthed and skirted the edge of the room. There was an opening at the other and though steam was hanging in the air beyond, Raina made for it. She was steps from the next tunnel when Atton spoke.

"If you've got a heat shield I'd switch it on." "The next room is filled with very hot steam-it'll scald the skin right off you." "If you shield and move fast you should be alright though." He said.

"Alright, switching on shields." "Here I go." Lorraina replied and dashed into the mist. A wave of heat blasted her from all sides. She ran as fast as her legs would carry her, even giving herself a little boost with the Force. And then she was in the next room and the heat faded away. She dropped against a wall and panted quietly.

"You make it?" Atton asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Lorraina answered. "Even got a free facial."

"I'm sure you look very radiant." Atton replied, chuckling. "Be careful." "I'm reading a large concentration of droids up ahead, and what looks like the control center." "If you can get to a terminal you might be able to disable the droids."

"Copy that." "I'll see what I can do." Lorraina stood up, recovered and stepped around the next bend.


End file.
